


Kiss The Troll

by theworldabouttodawn



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, davekat - Freeform, sort of humanstuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-14
Updated: 2014-06-14
Packaged: 2018-02-04 16:33:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1785868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theworldabouttodawn/pseuds/theworldabouttodawn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave gets a lodger that turns his life upside down. Based on the Chameleon Circuit song "Kiss the Girl" and, by extension, the Doctor Who episode "The Lodger", although not a crossover.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kiss The Troll

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my belated little contribution for 6/12, aka our dear little Karklesparkles’ birthday. Sorry it’s late. The hotel I was staying at didn’t have free wifi. THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS. It’s not one of my best works but I hope you enjoy it! :D (by the way this is also my first ever homestuck fanfiction)
> 
> I don’t own anything.
> 
> * waves * Hi OOC Dave and Karkat! Nice to see you here!

Your name is DAVE STRIDER and it’s 3:24 in the afternoon and a stranger just showed up on your doorstep asking about the room you had available for rent even though you literally put the advertisement out this fucking morning. She says her name is Jade Harley and she seems like the perfect lodger – her references are pristine and she’s offering to pay about three times the amount you asked for in cash. A bit loopy but pretty nice and you think you’ll enjoy living with her and anyways, you need the cash since Bro’s left you to live on your own.

Harley says it’s really important that she see the room right this fucking minute because it’s a matter of the survival of the universe or something but you’re happy to oblige, darting off to your room and putting the cash away. She looks around, drops her stuff, squeals a bit over your decorating choices (this was Bro’s room but you’ve tried to make it nice and she seems to like the stuffed bear you decided to throw in the corner on a whim) and asks you, “Where’s the kitchen?” You raise one eyebrow (hidden by your shades, of course) but the big brown bag of cash is already under your bed so you comply with your strange lodger and direct her to the kitchen, which is relatively clean and neat now that the smuppets and shitty katanas are gone. You can actually make edible meals here.

Surprisingly, she makes a beeline to your fridge and scrabbles around for a bit before coming up with eggs, tomatoes, onions, and celery (you don’t remember buying fresh vegetables but whatever), turns on the stove, and starts making what appears to be…an omelette. A FUCKING OMELETTE. Guess the universe doesn’t need saving.

Suddenly she notices the pictures on your fridge. Dammit, you should have taken those down but whatever. “Who’s that boy in those pictures?” she asks.

“My best friend,” you answer. She raises an eyebrow (obviously she thinks you’re gay – why else would she have felt comfortable moving in) and you add quickly “He’s not my boyfriend! He’s just a friend…who’s a boy! There is nothing the fuck wrong with that, is there?”

She laughs before covering her mouth and apologising. “Oh my god, I’m sorry for – I mean I just assumed you were – ”

You cut her off. “Yeah, I’m gay. So? That doesn’t make him my boyfriend!”

Turning back to her omelette, Jade remarks “You must at least _like_ him then!”

Taken aback, you retreat into your coolkid shell and demand, “What are you, some kind of love expert?”

“Not at all. It’s fucking obvious, Dave – may I call you Dave?” Jade asks, flipping the omelette onto a plate. “You don’t have any photos of anyone else besides him. And you look at him like – like you have a thing for him or something. Furthermore, your defensive attitude makes it fucking obvious.” Turning off the stove, she adds, “I really hope I didn’t tell you anything you didn’t already know! Sorry if I did!”

You roll your eyes, knowing she can’t see it under your shades, but there’s something about your strange new lodger that makes you want to trust her although she’s a kind of loopy and nosy girl you just met. She’s right – you are in love with Karkat Vantas, but he’s much too good for you. “Karkat – his name is Karkat Vantas - is my best friend and he rocks my world and fine then, I’m in love with him. So what of it?”

“Aren’t you going to tell him?” Jade asks, hunting around for a fork with which to eat her omelette.

“Dishwasher,” you say automatically.

She finds an eating utensil and takes a tentative bite of her omelette before holding it up and asking, “You want some?”

You shake your head and take a bottle of AJ out of the fridge. “Nah, I’m good, thanks.”

Fucking girl asks again, “You aren’t going to tell him?”

“Why the fuck would I? He won’t say yes!” Taking a seat at the kitchen table, you motion for her to take one too.

Smirking, she does so. “Say yes to what? You’re not asking him to marry you or anything! Anyways, why wouldn’t he, seeing as that you two seem to be really close?”

“Because he’s a fucking genius and is in law school and I’m kind of just sitting here as a college dropout who DJs for seedy bars! The only reason we even know each other is because he’s my downstairs neighbour and we both grew up in this building!”

She just gives you a knowing smile and flashes you a bucktoothed grin before rinsing out the dish and the pan. “All the same…”

“No.”

 

*

 

Jade’s turned off her bedroom night before you even leave for your gig but all the same, you knock on her door and say, “Just letting you know that I’m going to work and won’t be back until three so if you hear something around that time, it’s not a burglar, okay?” She shouts something back that sounds like affirmation and you head out the door at 8:43.

On your way out of the building, you stop at Karkat’s door for a moment, wondering if you should drop in and say hi, at the very least, but then you hear laughter and it sounds like he has friends over (probably that douchebag Gamzee) so you decide against it.

Later (2:11 AM) he comes to the bar where you’re working at, towing (or being towed by – his facial expression suggests the latter) a bunch of friends that includes his ex Sollux Captor for some reason, and you ask nonchalantly if he (just him, of course, no one else) wants to come over to your place tomorrow night to watch a movie or play video games or have a drink or something since it’s your day off. He says sure, he’s got nothing better to do, and walks away because Terezi wants to dance. You heave a long sigh.

 

*

 

Jade’s up bright and early the next morning and you groan because it’s only 8:03 AM and she’s at your door calling, “I can make you breakfast if you want!”

You attempt to untangle yourself from your sheets and call, “It’s all right, you don’t have to!” and go back to sleep.

Awakening again at a more reasonable hour (11:17, if anyone is interested) you stumble to the shower, brush your teeth, wash your face, and get dressed. When you walk out to the kitchen, you see a plate with an omelette on it (what the fuck is it with this girl and omelettes?) and a note next to it.

“hey dave! :D

im out to work and ill be back around 5:30! i know you didnt want me to make you breakfast but i made you one anyways! if its cold you can just microwave it for around a minute! hope you enjoy! :)

~jade harley

ps i really like the room and im probably going to stay :)”

 

You shrug and microwave the omelette as you were instructed to. It’s surprisingly good and you find yourself looking forward to living with Jade Harley, especially if she cooks for you. Which is a little strange, come to think of it. Tenants normally don’t cook for their landlords or anything, especially if they’re paying as much as Jade is. You resolve to speak to her about it when she gets back home.

Which reminds you that Karkat is coming over tonight for a drink and possibly a movie. You have to tell Jade about that as well and ask that maybe she stay quiet and stay in her room or go out or something – you feel bad about it but hey, she brought it on herself by suggesting you ask Vantas out, so she can fucking deal – and you have to find the right movie. You know he loves his romcoms but you don’t want to get something too romantic because that would seem like too much of a come-on and you don’t want it to feel like that if things don’t go as planned or something.

Eventually you say to hell with it and resolve to wait until he comes so you can pick a movie to watch together or maybe just play video games or something. You don’t really know and although you think you should care, you just don’t and that’s all right too. So you spend the rest of the day working on your webcomic and getting some advance strips done so you can afford to relax for a while if you ever need to. Not that it’s ever happened before, but it’s good to plan ahead.

Jade comes home at 5:30 sharp, knocks on your door and brightly asks you about your day. You let out a grunt, pry yourself out of your desk chair and throw on a button-down shirt that looks clean and some black skinny jeans, realising that it’s probably time to start making dinner. “Jade?”

She looks up from where she’s parked herself on her bed with her laptop. “Yes?”

“I invited a friend over to come watch a movie or play video games or whatever so could you, like…” God this is awkward.

“Stay out of the way? Sure!” Thank God she gets your drift. Maybe it’s not something to be too thankful for, because she winks suggestively at you before turning back to her laptop.

You decide that you should probably make dinner for her as well, even though you laid down in the rules last night that each of you buys their own groceries and makes their own meal. She made you breakfast, after all. “What do you want for dinner?”

“Oh, I’m not hungry! I had a little something before I came home so I’m fine. Thanks though!” Nodding, you turn around before realising that you never thanked her for the omelette, so you do so and she grins at you. There’s something eerily familiar about her but you can say for sure you have no idea what it is.

You make macaroni and cheese casserole for dinner with a bunch of celery sticks for dinner because you can’t be bothered to actually cook vegetables when celery is so clearly THE BOMB. Going to Jade’s room, you are about to call her name when you hear crying coming from the other side of the door. Driven by some instinct (is it just that she’s a crying girl and you want to comfort her or is it more of the familiarity that you think you feel?) you gently rap on the door and ask, “Can I come in?”

She sniffles a bit before calling, “I guess so.”

Pushing open the door, you sit beside her on the bed (putting her glasses carefully on the nightside table) and hand her the box of tissues sitting on the dresser. Nodding her thanks, she pulls a tissue out of the box and blows her nose before crumpling the tissue and putting it on the nightside table.

Carefully, because you barely know this girl and honestly you have no right to pry into her personal matters, even if you are for all intents and purposes her landlord, you ask, “What’s wrong?”

Shaking her head, she replies, “It…it’s nothing, Dave.”

Awkwardly, you look away and adjust your shades. “Sorry. Not my business, I suppose.” Standing up, you add “I just wanted to let you know that dinner is ready, but you don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to.”

“Oh! Um, thanks, Dave. Maybe later,” she says, reaching for another tissue. You try out a smile – it isn’t something you do too often – and leave to go eat your mac and cheese and celery by yourself. Hey, at least Karkat’s coming over tonight.

You stick the dirty dishes in the sink (you’ll deal with them later) and sit down at your laptop to see if you can get any real work done i.e. job hunting because this DJing business can only go on for so long.  But you keep on finding your eyes wandering to the clock and your mind wandering to who the fuck knows where. Nothing’s going to get done today and you know it.

Suddenly (at 7:46) you hear a loud rapping on the door and, much more excited than you ought to be, you force yourself not to run. “ ‘Sup, Vantas,” you say as you yank open the door, hoping you sound calm and collected.

“Hey, Strider,” he replies.

“How’s your day been?” you ask. Goddammit, you’re getting nervous and as a result, your conversation skills just went to hell. You mentally beat yourself over the head, but you add, “I couldn’t find any good movies, so do you want to play a video game or something?”

He shrugs, heading for your fridge. “You got anything good this time around, fuckass?”

“Not really, just some Coors Light, Sam Adams and Tsingtao. Oh, there’s a bit of that Absolut from a while back left,” you offer. In all honesty, you’re not too big on the alcohol thing (apple juice for the win) but everyone else seems to like it so you just go with the flow.

Selecting a can of Coors Light for himself and a bottle of ambrosia (AJ, for the uninitiated) for you, Karkat brings them over to where you’ve already pulled all your games out of the TV console. He’s about to hand you the bottle when suddenly Jade emerges from the hallway, seemingly completely recovered. When she sees your guest, she flashes a grin, waves, and says, “Don’t mind me, I’m just Dave’s tenant!”

“Strider’s tenant?” Karkat opens his can of beer and takes a long drink before continuing. “Since when did you have a tenant?”

Opening your bottle of AJ, you roll your eyes and reply, “She moved in yesterday. Karkat, this is Jade Harley. Jade, this is Karkat. Your dinner’s on the counter, by the way.” You shoot a pointed look at the girl, hopefully telling her to get her damn dinner and go somewhere else because you have a job to do.

You may have expected a lot of things to happen this night, but the one thing you would never have seen coming in a million years was Karkat saying, “Do you want a drink?” like it was his fucking house or something. (You have to firmly push down the accompanying images and ideas that come with Vantas treating your house like his own.) At least he doesn’t comment on the fact that _you_ made _her_ dinner.

Just as taken aback as you are (although you pray fervently that your face doesn’t show it), Jade hesitates for a second before shrugging and saying, “Why not?” She picks up the plate with the casserole and the sticks of celery on it and comes to the couch, arranging herself and her belongings on one side, leaving enough room for you and Karkat to sit next to each other although you can tell it’s going to be pretty cramped. You don’t mind, and you hope Karkat won’t either.

Trying to take the ball back from him, you go to the fridge. “We have Coors Light, Sam Adams, Tsingtao…”

“Oh, um, I don’t drink beer,” she says, somewhat embarrassed. “Bad experiences.”

Shrugging (you like her more and more even though she’s being the world’s worst cockblocker right now) you continue, “…milk, water, orange juice, coke, and apple juice. Anything strike your fancy?”

“Um…I guess just water will be fine,” she says. As you get the requested dihydrogen monoxide, she takes a tentative bite of the mac and cheese. “This is good!” she says after swallowing.

You turn around, eyebrow raised to a point where you hope she can see it above your shades. “You sound surprised.”

She accepts the cup of water you hand her and shrugs. “You don’t seem like the kind of person who cooks well.”

“And what is that supposed to fucking mean?” you ask as you sit down on the other side of the couch, a little harsher than you intended to be.

“…that you’re not just some stupid DJ?” she offers tentatively. You shrug and accept it.

Karkat gives up trying to make sense out of the jumble of discs and cases on the floor (to be honest, most of them are bootleg copies) and comes to the sofa, snarling at you to “move over, fuckass!” You comply because you’re not in the mood for an argument, although Karkat’s small stature and petite build really don’t require that much room. (Also, you have to bury the urge to put your arm around his shoulders.)

You contemplate taking this moment of silence to ask Karkat out or something but Jade’s here and she’s killing the mood and _ugh_ , why did you have to let the room out in the first place. At least the stupid girl realises the awkward silence that her presence is creating and speaks up, although what she says is something you never would have expected to come from anybody. Tonight is just full of surprises, isn’t it? “Dave, um, there’s this huge and really scary crack in the wall.”

“A crack? Fucking shit, I had that room refurbished and everything before I even put out an ad,” you say irritatedly.

Having finished the mac and cheese, Jade puts the plate down onto the coffee table and leans forward. “No, it’s not really _in_ the wall, per se. Sort of superimposed on the wall. It’s more of a crack in the fabric of reality…goddammit, I’ll just have to show you.” She stands up, pulls you up by your collar (how the fuck did she even manage to do that – you must be twice her size), and stalks off to her room, pulling you with her, muttering something about how “this was easier when you had a cape”. (Karkat follows curiously.)

When she finally lets go of your collar, she puts her hands on your shoulders and orients you so that you’re facing the wall above the nightstand. Sure enough, there’s this huge-ass crack in the wall that you could swear on the stairs (that keep happening) that you’ve never seen before. And it scares you too, although you’d never admit it. “What the hell?”

You feel yourself drawn to the crack (ugh, you wish you hadn’t read that creepy manga last night – “This is my hole! It was made for me!”) and you take first one hesitant step, then another towards it.

Suddenly you find yourself drifting in a black sea or something and images, memories, are rushing through your head. Jade and Karkat are pretty prominent in most of them (although Karkat has grey skin and candy-corn horns for some reason), but there’s also a bucktoothed boy with glasses who could be Jade’s brother or something, a shorthaired blonde girl who seems to be always either knitting or reading, and some humanoid grey-skinned horned creatures that look like these memories’ version of Karkat.

Just as suddenly, you’re back in Jade’s room, gasping for breath. A detached corner of your mind observes with some satisfaction that Karkat is in the same state as you are, but another part of you screams _there’s something wrong with him, he isn’t right, something happened_. “What the hell was that?” you ask to no one in particular.

“Did you see? Do you remember?” Jade seems to be a bit too excited for the current situation but maybe she’s one of those people who thrives on the strange and supernatural.

You roll your eyes and shake your head. “I saw, but I don’t remember,” you parrot back. And then you freeze when you heard Karkat whisper an affirmative. In answer to Jade’s question, not your response.

She rushes to his side and helps him stand upright – evidently he was much more affected by the crack than you were. He looks at her (you can’t help but be jealous) and suddenly screams, “WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED? HOW THE HELL DID WE ALL END UP ON EARTH AS FUCKING HUMANS WITH NO MEMORY OF THE GAME OR ANY-FUCKING-THING ELSE? AND WHY THE FUCK DO YOU REMEMBER?”

Surprisingly (ugh, you are so very done with surprises) Jade reacts to this characteristic outburst only with a grin. “Witch of Space, idiot. This kind of thing never could have affected me.”

“Well, fuck you and your crazy space god tier powers,” he mutters.

You have no idea what’s going on.

 

*

 

Karkat and Jade stay late up into the night talking (you hear the door close at 1:18) and you feel like the third wheel even though five hours ago you could have sworn that Karkat reciprocates your feelings. You take back everything you ever thought about looking forward to living with Jade – she’s nice enough but she needs to _go_ before she steals what should be rightfully yours.

But of _course_ Karkat would pick Jade over you. She’s nice, and warm, and pretty, and intelligent, and she seems to know what she’s doing and what’s going on with this fucking crack while you’re kind of just sitting here just as clueless as the crow on your window.

You don’t have the heart to kick Jade out though since she might have a problem finding somewhere else to live if she has that on her record, but you make sure that the next time Karkat comes over, she’s out of the house. Thankfully, she doesn’t ask about her whereabouts, but when you two settle down, all he can talk about is what he was talking about with Jade.

So apparently he’s a troll, not a human, along with Terezi and Gamzee and Sollux and who knows who else and they came from a planet called Alternia in the universe before the one you’re currently living in. And they played a game called Sgrub or some shit like that and destroyed their universe and created yours. Then you and Jade and Jade’s brother and your sister (what the fuck) played the human version of the game and destroyed the world but since a rogue NPC went ballistic and started screwing everything up, you had to initiate something called “the Scratch” which resets the universe and then another version of Bro and Jade’s grandparents/parents (you don’t really understand this and you don’t think you want to) and your/your sister’s mom played the game instead. But then a universe-transcending demon rampaged _their_ session and ended up sending everyone to yet _another_ version of Earth, which is where you currently are now, but Jade’s the only one who remembers because she was the Witch of Space or some shit like that and she’s trying to find everyone because these cracks are appearing all over the place which mean that you all can get back to where you were before “Lord English” wiped your minds.

Oh, and you were apparently the Knight of Time. That makes more sense than everything else, considering that you’ve always been able to know _exactly_ what time it was, which has been weird but useful in many ways. But you can’t take any of this seriously, and anyways Karkat keeps on talking about all this shit the next feel times you see him and you just wish Jade had never come into your life because you were fine without her (besides the hot breakfasts she leaves you every day, of course).

The next time Karkat and Jade meet (at your place, at least – you don’t want to think about them seeing each other anywhere else although to be brutally honest Karkat isn’t your property or anything) Jade says that she’s been researching (her “job” consists of going out and trying to find everyone else because everyone is in this city but _damn_ , it’s huge, but she and another troll named Kanaya are the Witch and Sylph of space respectively so they know what’s going on) and she thinks she can get Karkat back into the session. She looks doubtfully at you, however, because either you honestly can’t remember or you don’t want to remember.

Karkat doesn’t make a decision right then and there, but you’re sick the next few days and can’t do anything besides stay in bed and mope. You’re a bit better the next time he comes over, but you still dread the decision that comes from him. And then he says, “I’m not going.” He doesn’t say why, but you allow yourself to entertain the hope that maybe, just maybe, it’s because of you. You would hug him, but you don’t want to get him sick.

Your relationships with both Karkat and Jade get better after this incident, but you’re still scared that he’s going to leave you for what apparently is real life. At the same time, however, you find yourself wanting more and more to remember what really happened but it’s just not happening. Jade tells you that maybe it’s because Karkat’s aspect is Blood so he’s more on the emotional side, which means his mind is more easily moulded to forget or remember, while yours is Time, which may be the most logical of them all. According to her, this means that while it must have been difficult for Lord English to wipe your mind in the first place, it will be just as difficult to bring your memories back. The only upside to the situation, she continues, is that Lord English doesn’t know where you are, so he can’t find any of you.

But then the day comes when that’s not true.

 

*

 

It’s 2:54 in the afternoon, exactly 35 days after Jade first arrived, and you’re sitting at your laptop whiling the time away until your job interview at 5. Suddenly the door slams open and you see Jade standing there, completely out of breath. You don’t know what the hell is going on but you hurriedly get her a tall glass of water. “Whoa, calm down there, girl. What’s wrong?”

She waves away the glass of water. “No…time,” she pants.

You roll your eyes behind your shades and shove the water into her hand. “Drink,” you order. “You can tell me what’s wrong faster if you do.”

Sighing, she does so, breathes a sigh of relief, puts the glass on the small table next to the door and says, “Lord English. He’s found us.”

“What the hell? I thought you said he didn’t know where we were!” you exclaim, worried despite yourself.

Jade shakes her head. “He didn’t, but now he does, and he’s really mad that he put us somewhere where we could continue to live our lives. Says he’s going to take us to a living hell where we won’t remember who we are.”

“Wait…you _talked to him_?” you ask in disbelief.

“I was with Kanaya. Nepeta, Dirk, Jake, Jane, Feferi, and Karkat when he appeared. We decided to meet in a bigger group for the first time. He must have felt the gathering or something because he found us. Kanaya and I were able to get Dirk and Nepeta out, but we have no idea where the rest of them are,” she says. “You have to come with me.”

“Why me? Isn’t there another Time player?” you ask petulantly before realising that she said Karkat had been taken by Lord English. “Fuck that, Karkat’s been taken?” She nods and you sigh. “Come on then. Let’s go.”

Unfortunately, there’s no need to “go” anywhere, because just then you hear a loud whooshing and banging coming from Jade’s room. “It’s the crack!” she exclaims. You two had tried to caulk it up or something since it was freaky and you didn’t want to be tossed in an ocean of memories every time you called her to dinner or something.

You’re not sure if you should go see what’s up like the archetypical horror hero or run away like the only sane person, but the decision is ultimately made by someone else. A towering green bald Hulk-like _thing_ with one gold peg leg and a really trippy coat crashes into the living room. Jade doesn’t say anything, but you know that that’s Lord English.

His presence must trigger something in your mind or something, because suddenly you _remember._ You don’t just remember the images that you saw from the crack, you _remember_ the memories because they happened to you, and now that they’re there in your brain you don’t understand how they ever could _not_ have been. And like an idiot, you turn to Jade and tell her that.

She screams at you to look out but it’s too late, some kind of force is tugging at your head and threatening to pull your brains out and you feel like your body is being pulled in all directions and a detached part of your mind observes that you spent all that time screaming at people in horror movies not to fucking turn their backs.

But there’s nothing you can do to stop it because your vision starts flickering between your ruined living room and a black pit. As your stints in your living room grow shorter and your time in the pit grows longer, you realise that _fuck_ , Karkat is there, and you don’t want to be separated from him. But at the same time Jade told you that Lord English said that this would be a living hell and _hell_ (you fail to notice the irony, which is a first) you are not going to spend any time here, and you aren’t going to let Vantas spend any more time here if you can fucking help it.

Then you realise that you’ve spent almost a full second in your living room, which is a record since the flashes began, and the next time you hear Jade screaming at you to think of something unintelligible. Lord English seems to be growing weaker, because then you’re there for almost two seconds and she’s telling you to “CONCENTRATE ON WHY YOU WANT TO STAY!”

And almost by instinct, you think of Karkat, and the way he always yells and curses at everything even though it’s just a façade like your coolkid one, and the way he feels on your shoulder when he falls asleep after a night of movie marathoning, and the way his hair smells when he’s nestled under your chin, and the way you love him because fuck the 21st century, this is true love and you believe in it now and yes, Karkat’s the reason you want to keep your old/new memories. And you know what? You’re done with this charade of nonchalance and indifference and since you’re still flickering you scream his name.

“Karkat!”

_i don’t want to leave him_

“KARKAT!”

_i can’t leave him_

“KARKAAAAAATTTT!!!!!”

_i love you karkat_

*

 

Suddenly you find yourself, along with everyone else, back on the meteor because that’s where it began and that’s where it will end, although you could have sworn you were on one of the Kid Guardians’ planets when Lord English wiped all your minds. You haven’t defeated him, and you know it, but you’ve survived his attack, and that’s what counts. Looking around, you do a quick head count, and yes, everyone is here but you can’t tell which mass of tousled black hair belongs to whom except that Jade is standing next to you.

And then Karkat comes running out of the crowd and leaps into your arms and he snarls at you to “never fucking leave me again, douchebag.”

“But what about Jade?” you ask, somewhat taken aback.

You can tell that she’s rolling her eyes when she says, “Oh, not again, not when Lord English could be back at any moment. For God’s sake, Dave, kiss the troll.”

And you do, and he kisses you back, and you really don’t give a flying fuck about anything else in existence.


End file.
